Today is the 9th day of the Omer.
In ancient times, the Israelites counted 50 days of harvesting barley between Pesach and Shavuot. Each sheaf, called an Omer, was offered at the ancient Temple. More recently, the tradition of Mussar—Jewish character development—began to encourage Jews to enumerate, throughout each of the 50 days of the Omer, the character traits that guide our lives. In a similar vein, this week, we will highlight figures from modern Jewish history who may inspire us toward our greatest religious and civic values.
On this day in 1882, Rose Schneiderman was born in Poland, the first of four children within her traditional Jewish household. Her parents boldly sent her to cheder, a religious school typically reserved for boys, before moving her to a Russian public school. In 1890, the family moved to New York’s lower east side. Her father died two years later, forcing her to abandon school after 9th grade to become a cashier, and, later, a garment worker. By 1903, she organized her first union shop, the Jewish Socialist United Cloth Hat and Cap Makers’ Union, where she quickly developed a reputation as an effective leader after she organized a successful strike opposing an open-shop policy. In 1908, she was elected vice-president of the New York chapter of the Women’s Trade Union League (WTUL).
Following the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire in 1911, which killed 146 garment workers, she helped establish the International Ladies Garment Workers Union and led its 1913 strike. Determined to outlaw sweatshop labor, she told New Yorkers, “I would be a traitor to those poor burned bodies if I came here to talk good fellowship… Every year thousands of us are maimed. The life of men and women is so cheap and property is so sacred… Public officials have only words of warning to us—warning that we must be intensely orderly and must be intensely peaceable, and they have the workhouse just back of all their warnings.”
Schneiderman worked tirelessly to advocate for minimum wage, an eight-hour workday, and women’s suffrage. Ultimately, she served as president of the WTUL and helped found the American Civil Liberties Union, as well as the Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers.
Schneiderman’s tireless commitment to women’s rights and to female labor illustrate the transformative power of gevurah—strength and resilience—in the face of adversity. As she suggested in her speech to fellow WTUL members following the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, though we strive for peace and unity, peace cannot come at the expense of our fellow citizen’s safety, nor can unity come from neglecting the plight of others. Rose Schniederman’s legacy sternly demands to know: How will we demonstrate gevurah, resolve, to ensure that all American lives are treated with equal regard and dignity?
— Rabbi Josh Knobel